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Glen S. Tamura, MD, PhD

Glen S. Tamura, MD, PhD

"Being in the hospital with your sick child is a great challenge - I strive to insure your child's care is the best possible, that you are informed and involved in decision-making, and that team members communicate seamlessly with each other and with you."

Glen S. Tamura, MD, PhD, is the director of the Inpatient Medical Service at Seattle Childrens Hospital and professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Tamura received his MD and PhD from Stanford University, and trained in pediatrics and pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Washington.

His clinical interests are focused on general inpatient pediatric medicine and infectious diseases. He is the former assistant director of the pediatric infectious diseases fellowship program. He teaches clinical skills to second-year medical students and mentors approximately 40 students throughout their medical school careers. Tamuras research interests include quality improvement and patient-centered care.

GBS are the leading cause of meningitis and sepsis in neonates in the United States and Western Europe. Dr. Tamura's laboratory studies the molecular pathogenesis of group B Streptococcal (GBS) infections. We are particularly interested in the bacterial adhesins and their cognate epithelial cell receptors that are involved in mucosal colonization.

We have successfully identified fibronectin and cytokeratin 8 as potential epithelial cell receptors. We have also identified two fibronectin adhesins, one definnitively (ScpB, the Streptococcal C5a peptidase) and one tentatively (GlnP, the glutamine permease).

Both of these proteins have other functions by which they were originally defined. We are in the process of defining the role of the different activities of these genes in bacterial adherence both in vitro and in vivo.

GBS have the unusual property of being able to bind specifically to immobilized fibronectin (iFn) and not to soluble fibronectin (sFn). The adhesin ScpB shares this property.

We are also in the process of defining the structural basis for this specificity using a variety of cutting edge biophysical techniques, including surface plasmon resonance and atomic force microscopy.

Seattle Children’s complies with applicable federal and other civil rights laws and does not discriminate, exclude people or treat them differently based on race, color, religion (creed), sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin (ancestry), age, disability, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state or local law. Financial assistance for medically necessary services is based on family income and hospital resources and is provided to children under age 21 whose primary residence is in Washington, Alaska, Montana or Idaho.